But I Have Promises To Keep
by Luriko-Ysabeth
Summary: The reasons for various behaviors.


But I Have Promises To Keep  
  
"I am sorry," the young man said with gentle formality, "but I can not   
permit you to harm these people. Be gone from this place, and trouble us   
no more; else I shall be forced to cause harm to you."  
  
The leader of the thugs smirked at him. "You and what army? Don't you   
know who we *are*, little man?"  
  
"I believe you to be about to inform me," he replied. Behind him Kaede   
pulled her kimono slightly apart as surreptitiously as she could manage,   
giving her legs more freedom to take longer strides.  
  
The gang leader glared at him, certain that he was being mocked but   
unable to determine quite how. "We're Ishin Shishi!"  
  
/Well, isn't this ironic./ "I've heard of the Ishin Shishi. They fought   
to create a new Japan, an era of enlightenment, where life was better for   
everyone and woman and children could walk the streets without being   
harassed."  
  
"Ah, come on! Nobody believes *that* bullcrap!" the group laughed.   
  
"The strong do what they like; the weak submit," their leader added.  
  
"I had friends," the soft-spoken man told him, his eyes narrowing, "who   
died for 'that bullcrap,' as you so elegantly put it." He felt the   
seduction of the anger rising within his breast, but did not succumb to   
its siren song.  
  
His master had taught him, years before, that anger was worthless if you   
let it use you. And the years since had taught him that all emotions as   
well were to be mastered and then used, focused and without waste.  
  
If he took out the one blocking the alley, Kaede and her brother Isamu   
could get away. The narrow way led straight back to the market and the   
safety that a crowd of people would bring.  
  
/Move... now./  
  
He leapt, knocking the man out with one precise blow of his sheathed   
sword. "Back to the fish stand!" he snapped quickly, foregoing the   
politeness of his usual mask.  
  
Kaede dipped her head once in acknowledgment, grabbed Isamu's arm   
tightly, and took off. The swordsman spun to face the remaining thugs,   
angling his scabbard so that it was poised for a rapid draw, hoping that   
they would do the sensible thing and back off.  
  
The 'Ishin Shishi' (who might well have been such in truth; many people   
had joined that loose alliance, few with the purest of motives) paid less   
attention however to his practiced stance and more to his slight figure.   
He had resigned himself some time ago to the fact that he was apparently   
going to have the build of an early adolescent for an indefinite amount   
of time, perhaps the rest of his life; despite his body being in essence   
whipcord muscle over bone, in his loose clothing he looked like a skinny   
kid with a pretty (albeit scarred) face.   
  
And to most people, these being no exception, that particular   
combination spelled E-A-S-Y M-A-R-K.  
  
They attacked.  
  
Vwhoosh.  
  
There, that was most of them knocked out, and --  
  
As he paused for a moment to catch his breath and determine what he'd   
have to do next, the aging roof above him, complete with panicked gang   
lookout, finally sighed and gave way.  
  
He *almost* leapt clear.  
  
it was only one loose tile that hit him on the head.  
  
But at the velocity it had acquired, he blacked out for a second; and as   
he swam back to consciousness again, he was aware of the distorted face   
of one of the two men he hadn't taken care of yet leaning over his and   
something -- /cloth/, his mind identified it -- around his throat.  
  
And it was growing tighter and he couldn't breathe and his hands clawed   
feebly at the strip but it was so fast and his concussed head couldn't   
THINK and air he needed AIR at least Kaede and Isamu got away oh please   
AIR --  
  
The merciful darkness claimed him as one thought swam through his lower   
consciousness, to be examined more fully later:  
  
/Well, isn't THIS ironic./  
  
  
He swam back into consciousness with the feeling of some indefinite   
wrongness.  
  
Hm. Everything *felt* there; he was sitting seiza, there was no   
sensation of blood or anything like that, and the terrible choking   
feeling was gone...  
  
That *was* odd. His breathing didn't seem to fill his senses the way it   
ordinarily did, and yet....  
  
He tentatively opened his eyes.  
  
"Well, *finally*," the woman before him remarked, looking down at him.   
"After all the bother you've caused and will cause, I have better things   
to do than wait for you to come back to yourself so that you can choose."  
  
  
He blinked. "Oro?"  
  
The woman remained. Her shining hair was long and uncut, as befitted a   
woman of noble blood. In contrast, her violet kimono and the darker   
underrobe were pushed open so much as to be nearly falling off her   
shoulders; below the golden obi's binding, it again spread to reveal   
quite an amount of white-sheathed leg.  
  
The legs were particularly evident because she was casually seated on an   
*oar*, of all things, attached to...  
  
Leaning sideways to try to determine precisely what it might be attached   
to, he found himself describing a loose circle in midair --  
  
He'd been sitting in MIDAIR?  
  
-- and noticing the street below him, empty now except for a sprawled   
figure.  
  
Regaining his earlier position, he carefully leaned slightly forward and   
looked down.   
  
/Is that me?/  
  
It certainly appeared to be. Although the face was partially turned down   
and covered by hair, that same bright red hair was unmistakable, as were   
the rather well-worn clothing and partially unsheathed sakabatoh beneath   
the figure.  
  
Its peculiar slackness was also familiar to him; he'd seen that   
particular sack-of-produce look far too many times ever to mistake it.  
  
"I'm dead," he said to the woman. "Am I not?"  
  
"Give the boy a bean-jam cake," she remarked sarcastically. "In a way,   
yes."  
  
"I am NOT a boy," he told her indignantly.  
  
She looked at him with the same expression his master had often regaled   
him with. "I, Sumire, have guided the warriors of Nobunaga and Onzoushi   
to the other world, and remember the Court of Heian in the days when Lady   
Murasaki Shikibu was writing her elegant comedy of manners for the   
amusement of the Empress. What are your years on this earth to that,   
boy?"  
  
"Etto... not much, I suppose."  
  
A faint smile graced her face.  
  
"Are you a goddess, O-Sumire-dono? And what did you mean by 'in a way'   
and 'bother?'"  
  
O-Sumire laughed in earnest this time, putting her hand before her mouth   
to politely disguise it. "To answer your first question first, no; I am   
merely a guide for crossing the Sanzu no Kawa. And as for 'bother' and so   
forth: you are a special case, you know. Several of us had to gather more   
detailed information in order to properly judge the best course of action   
in this situation."  
  
"Information?" He was truly puzzled now.  
  
"We interviewed those who are acquainted with you." Her mouth twisted.   
"That teacher of yours made a *most* improper proposal to me."  
  
"Sh-sh-*shishou*!?"   
  
"Whatever made him think that I would entertain such?" Her hair seemed   
almost to rise and fan out in indignation.  
  
"Perhaps if you pulled your kimono a bit tighter... " he suggested   
tentatively.  
  
She looked down her nose at him. "What, and melt?"  
  
The noise and bustle of the market could be heard clearly in the   
distance.  
  
"What situation?" he finally said, curious.  
  
"It has to do with what you are," O-Sumire began.  
  
/Oh./ The blood had soaked deep enough into his soul, then, that the   
Lords of Hell needed to devise some special punishment?   
  
"I see," he said, inclining his head. He would take it, whatever it   
might be. And yet, even now, he could not see how he could have done   
anything other than what he did.  
  
"Oh, you knew then? It'll make it easier not to have to explain about   
your being not quite human."  
  
/WHAT?/  
  
  
O-Sumire was tapping her fingers on the handle of her oar when he   
managed to think himself up from the ground and back to a position before   
her. "It's not polite to deceive people like that," she remarked to the   
empty air. "I thought you knew about your being han'you."  
  
"It... makes sense," he ventured. "Of many things. But -- how?"  
  
"In the usual way, of course."  
  
He blinked, violet eyes beginning to narrow. "And what is the usual   
way?"  
  
"It seems that your mother went to a shrine to pray for a child," the   
guide said in a pedantical tone, "and a youkai happened to be wandering   
by and heard her, and saw her to be pretty."  
  
"'Tall and lordly, and woven of moonshine,'" the redhead said quietly.   
"Yes, of course. She told me the story -- I just never put it together...   
"  
  
"There are a fair amount of you around," O-Sumire resumed, "but usually   
either the youkai heritage finds a rather obvious outlet, or you get   
killed very thoroughly, or both, or -- well, in any case, usually your   
files have very definite death dates. But yours has two possibilities, so   
-- " She shrugged.  
  
"Two possibilities?"  
  
"Depending," she explained. "on whether you choose to be human or   
youkai."  
  
  
Even the sounds of the market seemed to have stopped now.  
  
"Explain, please," he said. "I seem to be dead *now*. Surely this is a   
moot point?"  
  
"You... died," O-Sumire explained, "because your lungs couldn't get any   
air and your brain thus starved for lack of oxygen. But it's not as if   
you were physically damaged; you could conceivably return to your body   
and take up your life again."  
  
Enticing. Or.. not so?  
  
"There must be," he said, his tone even, "more to this."  
  
"Naturally," the woman from the other world agreed. "Your choices are   
two. To be no more than human, and to die in this place, and for me to   
guide you across the River of Three Forks and to the country near the   
Gates of Judgement. Your wife waits there, in a small house, while her   
case is put on hold. You, too, might wait there, to sleep at long last,   
and be healed of all your wounds, and wake to rest with her in a place   
where time has little meaning, until at last the two of you are ready to   
walk through the Gates; and I am authorized to tell you that in this   
lifetime you have expiated many of the burdens that had weighed you down,   
and that after your sleep whatever awaits you will not lie heavy upon   
you.  
  
"Or -- you can be youkai in truth, as before you feigned being. You drew   
upon the suppressed ki from that side of yourself to use the power of the   
Hiten Mitsurugi school far better than any human your age should, and to   
become a legend in Kyoto some years before; it could flow freely through   
your body, giving you more endurance and more recuperability than any   
mere mortal might attain." Her head tilted slightly. "Much more than your   
shishou.  
  
"And you would never more be human. Your aging, already slow, would seem   
to stop; any human friends you might make would grow old and die around   
you, while you seemed no older than the day you met. You would be hurt,   
greatly, and your reward for enduring that pain would be more pain to   
add. Not in a hundred years and more will you be able to be happy without   
having that happiness shattered within a mere eight of years. The world   
will change to some strange thing that you cannot even comprehend now;   
and for much of your life you will be lonely, lonelier than you are now,   
sundered by time and space from any who would understand you.  
  
"Well?"  
  
"Must I answer immediately?" he asked.  
  
"Not immediately," she said. "In this moment we are outside of time. But   
soon, for this moment cannot be held long. And no one may help you in   
this; you must decide for yourself."  
  
"I see." The young man's sight turned inward, as he sat seiza and   
remained thus for a long time. Finally he looked up. "May I ask a   
question?"  
  
"You may *ask*," O-Sumire said. "I may or may not answer; but you may   
ask."  
  
"You have told me," he began, "how I would be affected by each choice.   
How... would other people be affected?"  
  
The guide smiled fully then, transforming her face to one of great   
beauty. "Good question, Himura. If you choose humanity... the fates of   
most of your close friends are set, and nothing you may do would change   
them. The common people of Yamato will muddle along somehow, as they   
always have: they will be born, some will bear children, some will grow   
old, all of them will die. They will suffer, but not as they have   
suffered; the government will be changed again and perhaps a third time,   
and progress will take three steps forward and two steps back, as always.  
  
  
"If you choose the other... you will make a few large changes, the   
effects of most of which will cease to be felt within a generation; you   
will save three of the people you now know, two of whom would not need   
saving had it not been for other deeds of yours; and the lives of a great   
many people you have not yet met will be rather better than they might   
have been, and a few *will* live who would have died if not for you. But   
many of those have not been born, nor have their parents: and, as I said   
before, it will be long and heartbreaking work, and even you cannot save   
them all."  
  
The small man traced, not quite nervously, the lines of the crossed   
scars on his cheek, looking at his fingers as if he expected to see them   
marked with blood.  
  
"It would," he said finally, "to be lovely to stop, and rest, and have   
it all go away. But -- "  
  
"But?"  
  
"I made promises. A few to people now living. Many to people now dead."  
  
"They will forgive you the breaking, if broken by death," O-Sumire told   
him. "Across the Sanzu no Kawa, there are no grudges. We don't let them   
by."  
  
"But, you see, even if I ignore the promises to all those I killed -- I   
cannot forget that I promised one other person. I promised me.  
  
"I promised me," he repeated. "That I would make a difference. That the   
new era wouldn't be another one where people get hurt -- and die --   
because those who could have saved them did not bother. So I cannot stop   
now, you see."  
  
"I see," his companion agreed.  
  
  
The urgent tones of a girl's voice echoed from the direction of the   
marketplace, the words muffled and distorted.  
  
"We are running out of time," O-Sumire warned him."You must return to   
your body at once. This will hurt."  
  
"I have been hurt before."  
  
"So you have." She gestured to his limp body. "Lie more or less inside,   
and I will jump-start your vital organs."  
  
"Oro?"  
  
"It's easier to do than to explain." She dropped to the ground and laid   
a hand on the lifeless chest, as he, after a shrug, threw himself down to   
occupy most of the same space as his former shell. "You will remember   
very little of this afterwards, except in dreams. However, I think the   
memory of your eldritch heritage will remain.  
  
"And may I say, Himura Shinta who was, how very proud I am of you?"  
  
"*Oro?*"  
  
And then *something* dealt him a tremendous blow to the chest, and the   
blackness claimed him again.  
  
  
Air!  
  
He wheezed and then gasped in air, drawing it past the thick throat into   
the chest that felt as if it had been kicked by a horse.  
  
/I wonder when that happened? Maybe one of them stepped on me./  
  
All of his ribs seemed to be in place, luckily. He sucked down another   
gasp.  
  
"Yo -- yokatta... " a voice breathed from above him. He opened his eyes.   
Kaede.  
  
"You should not be here," he choked out, scolding her gently.  
  
"I brought them," Kaede told him, gesturing to his right. He turned his   
head and managed to raise himself a bit. Ah. Police.  
  
"I thank you," he managed, ignoring the protests from his overworked   
throat. "You must have frightened them away from strangling me."  
  
That had been the closest he had come to death in some time; no wonder   
he still had an odd feeling. The rush of merely being alive, and not dead   
despite all odds, was familiar to him; yet it was not usually so sharp,   
so perfect an imitation of the well-being he could not logically be   
feeling now.  
  
/Han'you... / a woman's voice whispered within his mind.  
  
One of the police officers shot a suddenly sharp glace at him.   
"Akage-yatsu, didn't I see you carting a sword around earlier today?"  
  
"What sword?" Kaede asked, adjusting her kimono to better cover the   
sakabatoh she was leaning over. "I don't see any sword."  
  
The officer snorted before turning away, followed, after a moment, by   
the other two.  
  
"Here, lean on me," the girl told him, helping him up.  
  
"No, it is all right," he reassured her. "It was a moment of weakness,   
but it is almost past." Indeed, he felt almost better than he had ever   
been.  
  
"Thank you for saving us," Kaede finally said after he carefully took a   
step, then another, without toppling on his face. "A... anoh... they have   
some very good fish for sale, and I'm getting out of practice only   
cooking for Isamu and myself, and it's a rather large table... "  
  
"I would be happy to share a meal with you before I leave," he smiled.  
  
"Leave?" Kaede looked crestfallen. "So soon?"  
  
"I have promises to keep," the redhead told her. "And miles to go... "  



End file.
